XXIII. For Winter came: the wind was his whip; He had torn the cataracts from the hills, And they clanked at his girdle like manacles. XXIV. His breath was a chain which without a sound XXV. Then the weeds, which were forms of living death, Fled from the frost to the earth beneath : Their decay and sudden flight from frost XXVI. And under the roots of the Sensitive Plant The birds dropped stiff from the frozen air, XXVII. First there came down a thawing rain, And its dull drops froze on the boughs again; Then there steamed up a freezing dew Which to the drops of the thaw-rain grew; XXVIII. And a northern Whirlwind, wandering about Shook the boughs, thus laden and heavy and stiff, XXIX. When Winter had gone, and Spring came back, The Sensitive Plant was a leafless wreck ; But the mandrakes and toadstools and docks and darnels Rose like the dead from their ruined charnels. CONCLUSION. WHETHER the Sensitive Plant, or that Ere its outward form had known decay, II. Whether that Lady's gentle mind, III. I dare not guess. But, in this life IV. It is a modest creed, and yet Pleasant if one considers it, To own that death itself must be, Like all the rest, a mockery. V. That garden sweet, that Lady fair, And all sweet shapes and odours there, In truth have never passed away: 'Tis we, 'tis ours, are changed; not they. VI. For love, and beauty, and delight, There is no death nor change; their might THE CLOUD. I. I BRING fresh showers for the thirsting flowers I bear light shade for the leaves when laid From my wings are shaken the dews that waken When rocked to rest on their Mother's breast, As she dances about the sun. I wield the flail of the lashing hail, And whiten the green plains under; II. I sift the snow on the mountains below, While I sleep in the arms of the Blast. In a cavern under is fettered the Thunder, Over earth and ocean with gentle motion Lured by the love of the Genii that move Wherever he dream under mountain or stream And I all the while bask in heaven's blue smile, III. . The sanguine Sunrise, with his meteor eyes, Leaps on the back of my sailing rack, When the morning star shines dead: As on the jag of a mountain crag Which an earthquake rocks and swings An eagle alit one moment may sit In the light of its golden wings. And, when Sunset may breathe, from the lit sea beneath, Its ardours of rest and of love, And the crimson pall of eve may fall From the depth of heaven above, With wings folded I rest on mine airy nest, As still as a brooding dove. IV. That orbed maiden with white fire laden Whom mortals call the Moon Glides glimmering o'er my fleece-like floor And wherever the beat of her unseen feet, May have broken the woof of my tent's thin roof, And I laugh to see them whirl and flee Like a swarm of golden bees, When I widen the rent in my wind-built tent,- V. I bind the Sun's throne with a burning zone, Sunbeam-proof, I hang like a roof; The mountains its columns be. The triumphal arch through which I march, When the Powers of the air are chained to my chair, The Sphere-fire above its soft colours wove, VI. I am the daughter of Earth and Water, And the nursling of the Sky: I pass through the pores of the ocean and shores; I change, but I cannot die. For after the rain, when with never a stain The pavilion of heaven is bare, And the winds and sunbeams with their convex gleams Build up the blue dome of air, I silently laugh at my own cenotaph,— And out of the caverns of rain, Like a child from the womb, like a ghost from the tomb, I arise, and unbuild it again. TO A SKYLARK. I. HAIL to thee, blithe spirit- Pourest thy full heart In profuse strains of unpremeditated art. II. Higher still and higher From the earth thou springest: Like a cloud of fire, The blue deep thou wingest, And singing still dost soar, and soaring ever singest. III. In the golden lightning Of the sunken sun, O'er which clouds are brightening, Thou dost float and run, Like an embodied joy whose race is just begun. IV. The pale purple even Melts around thy flight; Like a star of heaven In the broad daylight, Thou art unseen, but yet I hear thy shrill delight v. Keen as are the arrows Of that silver sphere In the white dawn clear, Until we hardly see, we feel, that it is there. VI. All the earth and air With thy voice is loud, From one lonely cloud The moon rains out her beams, and heaven is overflowed. |